by Graham Brack
‘They’re bright kids.’
‘They’re the future, and I’m ancient history. Come on, old friend, I’m getting maudlin. Put me on the night bus and let’s go home.’
Chapter 20
The morning dawned bright and cheerful, and the sun slanted down on a police headquarters that was missing Josef Slonský. During the night an idea had occurred to him, and he was therefore moving from office to office collecting signatures and permits. It might have been helpful if he had communicated his intentions to his increasingly frantic boss, who was unsure whether to tear up the paper in his top drawer, or go ahead with it. It also crossed his mind that Slonský might have been seized by Griba’s men with a view to swapping him for the criminal. If that happened the official policy of the government was that the captors would be told that no deal was possible and they must do their worst. Lukas would have felt very uneasy about condemning Slonský to death in that way, the only mitigating factor being that Slonský would undoubtedly have done the same if the roles were reversed. Indeed, if a deal were to be done, Slonský himself would probably repudiate it. But that did not make it any easier for his bemused superior.
If he had only thought to ask Mucha, his mind might have been set at rest, because Slonský had consulted the desk sergeant before beginning his quest, and a small smile was flickering across Mucha’s lips even now as he stood arranging the staff roster for the next month. Its cause was not the thought of giving himself a weekend shift when his wife’s sister was coming to stay, nor even of the pleasure he would derive from making that slimy little toad Bureš work on his birthday, but of the lengths Slonský was prepared to go to in order to ensure a conviction. His plan might not work, but you had to admire the fact that he was even bothering to try.
Tripka looked up as Slonský and Navrátil entered the interview room. Slonský sat opposite the disgraced policeman and placed a box on the table. Removing the lid, he carefully lifted the contents out and stood it in front of him.
‘Recognise this? I thought you’d like to see your dad again.’
‘What do you mean by digging him up? What has this to do with him?’
‘I’ve brought him in for questioning in connection with a very serious offence that he may have committed. He’s just as guilty as you, so this way you both get to spend thirty years behind bars. I admit it probably won’t worry him as much as it will you, but you’ll enjoy each other’s company. Unless you’d prefer me to scatter him in the exercise yard?’
‘No! You can’t do this. It’s inhuman.’
‘Inhuman? That’s rich coming from someone who held a teenage girl down while his mate raped and slashed her. What’s inhuman about scattering ashes? It happens all the time. What would be inhuman would be if I took this urn and emptied the contents down the toilet, but fortunately you have an hour to prevent that.’
‘You wouldn’t dare.’
‘Wouldn’t I? Now that’s where you’re wrong, because I’ve done a lot of stupid things as dares in the past. Running across the railway line when the express was coming, skiing over a blind jump, eating sushi — this would just be another in a long line. Now, you give a fresh statement to Navrátil while I go and pick the wax seal off the lid of the urn.’
‘You’re a monster, Slonský. We’re the same vintage. We’ve worked together for years. You know what the old days were like. Why couldn’t you just let me take the best way out, for old times’ sake?’
Slonský leaned menacingly over the table and spoke slowly but with passion.
‘Because you’re an ordinary criminal, and ordinary criminals don’t get to avoid a trial by shooting themselves. Because we were never that close anyway and I’ve despised you for many years. It was probably unfair of me because I disliked you because of what your father was, but that’s how I felt. Because Jana Válková and Edvard Holoubek deserve to be avenged for what you did to them. They weren’t offered a clean, quick death with a pistol. Because if I don’t put you in the dock I’m as bad as you are, and I have enough on my conscience already without doing anything else that I shouldn’t.’
Tripka closed his eyes and seemed to be composing himself.
‘I didn’t go to Jana’s house intending her any harm. If I’d known what Sedláček was going to do I’d never, ever have taken him. I let my loyalty to a friend get in the way of what I should have done. You have to remember I was very young.’
‘Young, but not an idiot. You knew right from wrong.’
‘Yes, and it was wrong. There, I’ve said it. I did wrong. I should have stopped him. I should have owned up. I didn’t know what my father would say when I phoned him. I suppose I hoped he’d stay with me while I was being questioned. It honestly didn’t occur to me that he would cover it all up. Even if he’d wanted to, I didn’t think he could. If he’d been caught he’d have been disciplined and disgraced.’
‘He’ll be disgraced now. Like father, like son, eh?’
‘I accept that I bear some of the blame for what happened to Jana. I also regret what happened to Holoubek. I didn’t really know what I thought Sedláček would do when I asked him to stop Holoubek asking for the case to be reopened. I can’t say it didn’t cross my mind that he might kill him, because nothing crossed my mind. I panicked, and I didn’t think. I was wrong and I deserve some of the blame. What proportion of the guilt is mine, I leave to others to decide.’
‘The greater the share Sedláček has to carry, the less there is for you. For what it’s worth, I believe you when you say you didn’t plan to hurt Jana. You liked her too much. And if Holoubek had left well alone you’d have left him alone. But he didn’t and you didn’t. Now, the last chance you have to redeem a bit of honour for yourself is to tell the whole story, stop Sedláček getting off and take your punishment like a man.’
Tripka took a deep breath and inspected his hands for some time. When he spoke, his voice was barely above a whisper.
‘In my house, there’s a crawlspace in the eaves alongside the guest bedroom. In there, there’s a metal toolbox. It’s painted blue. If you lift the top tray out you’ll find a bundle of letters from Sedláček that he wrote while he was in the army here. In a couple of them he talks about what happened to Jana. He says he enjoyed it and wanted to do it again. He recalls how she tried to shake him off her despite having her hands tied. I kept them so that if he ever tried to incriminate me I could turn the tables.’
‘You’re not very trusting, are you?’
Tripka raised his head, and his sad brown eyes met Slonský’s.
‘Only a fool trusts Sedláček. I may be a fool, but even I’m not that stupid.’
Slonský acknowledged the truth of this statement with a cursory nod.
‘We’ll go and get the letters. If you’re right, we can start talking about mitigating your sentence.’ He started to walk to the door, then turned back, picked up the urn, and handed it to Tripka. ‘Villain or not, he’s still your dad. Take care of him.’
Slonský was no psychologist, but he could detect a certain amount of latent hostility in Sedláček’s attitude to him. For a start, the hoodlum was slightly put out that he had been shot.
‘When I get out, you’ll regret that,’ he said.
‘When you get out, I’ll be sitting on a cloud with wings,’ Slonský corrected him, ‘or I’ll be over ninety. I suppose you’ll run me over like Holoubek, now that you’ve got your eye in and you know exactly how to take out old age pensioners with a van.’
‘I’m not going inside. What sort of evidence have you got that would hold me?’ Sedláček asked scornfully.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Slonský, ‘I’m not allowed to discuss whatever evidence we have in detail. But I can tell you that Tripka will tie you to the murder of Válková, Pluskal will say you ordered the killing of Holoubek and the kidnapping of Peiperová, and some Albanian acquaintances of yours have been queueing up to give us evidence on a range of other events in recent years.’
‘Losing rivals ca
n’t be trusted to tell the truth,’ Sedláček replied.
‘That’s fair comment, but I don’t think they’re too worried about whether it’s the truth, so long as it puts you away for a long time. Come to think of it, I agree with them. Whatever they’re fabricating, I hope it stands up in court.’
Back at the office, Navrátil voiced their shared concern.
‘Have we got enough to hold him?’
‘The prosecutor says so. He reckons he’ll get convictions on the murder of Holoubek and the abduction of Peiperová without much difficulty. The murder of Válková is more problematic, but we’ve got an eye-witness, Sedláček’s letters and a conspirator’s sworn statement. Either way, you’ll be close to retirement when he gets out.’
Peiperová and Navrátil came to stand in front of Slonský’s desk. As their shadow blotted out the feeble light from the bulb overhead, he looked up to see them standing side by side to attention.
‘May we have a word, sir?’ Navrátil began.
‘If I say no?’
‘I’ll ask instead, sir,’ Peiperová explained.
‘I take it the use of the word “we” is significant, in view of my warning that there mustn’t be a “we”.’
‘It is, sir. We’ve become a “we”,’ Navrátil explained.
‘Congratulations. Are you still standing there because you’re expecting a present?’
‘No, sir,’ Peiperová interjected. ‘We’re wondering what happens to me now. Plainly I can’t stay here if Navrátil and I are engaged, and I’m only with you temporarily anyway.’
‘Not so fast, young lady. How do you know I won’t keep you and give Romeo here the elbow?’
Peiperová looked anxiously at Navrátil, who was definitely flustered by this turn of events. His face was reddening and he had the facial expression of a frog with dyspepsia.
‘Because that wouldn’t be fair to Navrátil, and you’re a fair man, sir.’
‘If you believe that you’re a shocking judge of character, my girl. I think there’s something you should both know.’
‘Sir?’ they chorused.
‘I went to see Captain Lukas yesterday to talk about my future. Let’s go and find him so he can tell you what he has decided.’
If Lukas’ office had possessed a back door, he might well have disappeared when he saw the three of them approach, but he was trapped. He invited them all to sit.
‘Now,’ he asked, adopting his most avuncular manner, ‘what’s all this about?’
Slonský motioned Navrátil to speak.
‘The thing is, sir, that Officer Peiperová and I—’
‘How are you, Peiperová? Recovering well?’
‘Yes, thank you, sir.’
‘Good. First class. Sorry, Navrátil, you were saying?’
‘Well, sir, when Officer Peiperová was kidnapped, it made me think that perhaps, in the fullness of time, she might possibly not be averse—’
‘We’re engaged, sir,’ Peiperová interrupted.
‘Excellent,’ Lukas responded. ‘I’m pleased for you both.’
‘Thank you, sir. However, we’re aware that there are rules about couples working together and we weren’t clear how separate we have to be. For example, can we work in the same department under different lieutenants?’
‘Ah, yes. Very good question.’
They sat in silence for a moment or two, until it dawned on Lukas that the only one who could answer that very good question was him.
‘There is a difficulty. Undoubtedly, having married — or even engaged — people working together can be tricky for their colleagues and is therefore frowned upon, but in the present circumstances I don’t have anywhere else to assign you. Dvorník and Doležal both have assistants already.’ He paused and looked squarely at Slonský. ‘You haven’t changed your mind, Lieutenant?’
‘No, sir,’ said Slonský stiffly.
‘Very well. We must deal with matters as we find them. Lieutenant Slonský has decided that if I am prepared to grant permission, he would like to have two trainees to look after. He says that he will not find that your relationship causes him any concern. Is that right, Slonský?’
‘Yes, sir, because I’m going to ignore it completely. In the event of untoward canoodling by either party, I shall put some bromide in Navrátil’s coffee or describe my prostate operation. Either of these steps should suffice to cool their ardour.’
Lukas did not reply at first, since he was contemplating his own prostate’s performance and his doctor’s plans for it, and feeling more than a little uncomfortable as a result.
‘I’ve signed the forms,’ he finally announced. ‘Officer Peiperová, you are now formally attached to Lieutenant Slonský.’
‘Though not in any physical sense,’ Slonský quickly added.
‘This calls for a celebration drink,’ Slonský announced. ‘We can raise a glass to your future at the same time as we celebrate a job well done in putting Sedláček and Tripka behind bars for years to come.’
‘I thought you’d be anti-marriage, sir,’ said Navrátil.
‘Me? No, marriage is a fine institution. For everyone else, that is.’
‘Forgive my asking, sir, but did you call Mrs Slonská as you promised?’
‘Ah, now, the thing is, I lost the number.’
‘No problem, sir. I found it. Here it is.’ He handed Slonský the crumpled napkin.
‘Maybe I’ll call later.’
Navrátil handed him his mobile.
‘Be my guest, sir. We’ll be at the bar.’
BOOK THREE: DEATH ON DUTY
Chapter 1
It was as close as Lieutenant Josef Slonský had ever come to an ecstatic religious experience. He had to admit that in the six months since Officer Kristýna Peiperová had arrived to join his team, there had been a number of changes. For example, she had instituted the Grand Night Out, when they all went out together once a month to enjoy ballroom dancing, bowling or skating. Slonský did not especially enjoy any of these, but he approved heartily of the principle, even though it meant spending the evening with a bunch of teetotallers, which in Slonský’s definition meant anyone who drank less than two litres of beer in a day.
Another change had been the marking of people’s name days or birthdays. For a long time nobody knew when Slonský’s birthday was, and he was still unsure how they had found out. Of course, Officer Jan Navrátil now had the telephone number of Slonský’s ex-wife — or, more accurately, the wife who would be an ex-wife but for a small clerical error when she failed to sign and return the paperwork — so that was a possibility. And Peiperová had a gift of winkling information out of people without giving the impression that it was anything other than idle chatter. Either way, it had been wonderful enough when they had given him a ticket to the All-Moravia Artisan Sausage-Making Championship, but when he was co-opted as a substitute judge after one was taken ill, he was as close to heaven as he ever expected to get.
He had found a nice little inn with the intention of making a weekend of it and after a simple lunch of beer and hunter’s stew with dumplings, he was busily contemplating entry number twenty-five, for which he scored a seven, being concerned that the skin was insufficiently extruded and therefore played too great a role in the overall chewing process. The meat content was good, though, and he would have given high marks for the seasoning. Moreover, unlike entry number eight, there was no foreign matter in it. Slonský had been shocked to discover that anyone would sink low enough to bind their sausage together with egg, which in his view made it a type of omelette. His indignation was fanned by the discovery that the other judges felt the same way, and he was fairly sure that the retired butcher who was chairing the panel would have hanged the man on his own meat hook, but they had tempered justice with mercy on the grounds that the evildoer was half-Hungarian and therefore could not be expected to know better.
Entry twenty-seven was chunky, a good colour, but perhaps a little heavy on the garlic. Slonský f
elt he had to deduct a point or two for the failure to let the flavour of the meat flow through, and was just marking his card when it occurred to him that he had not seen number twenty-six.
He sought out the nearest judge to compare notes. He, too, had not sampled number twenty-six, nor had any of the other judges, although the sausage-maker in question had registered on arrival earlier that day. The organisers were perplexed, because they knew that Mr Mazura was a keen competitor and highly fancied by the sausage-making cognoscenti to come away with a prize. He had been seen as the tables were being set up, but his post was now unmanned and his ingredients were hopelessly overcooked.
A search was instituted in case he had been taken ill somewhere, and after about a quarter of an hour a series of loud cries announced that the quest had been successful. Mr Mazura was found gagged and tied to a post in a barn on the outskirts of the village, a placard round his neck proclaiming that he had been seized by a party of militant vegetarians for crimes against the animal kingdom. There was uproar, and a number of persons worthy of investigation were denounced to the local policeman, who appealed to Slonský for help in detecting the perpetrators.
Slonský had been hoping to have a weekend free from consideration of crime, when a second series of cries proved how cunning the whole thing had been and how unlikely it was that his ambition would be fulfilled.
‘The trophies!’ yelled the chief judge breathlessly. ‘They’ve all gone!’
Mr Mazura was shaken by his experience, but answered the question Slonský put to him, after which the detective showed no interest in him, but went off to make a couple of phone calls.
Mazura had managed to see that the van he was bundled into was small and red with a registration number ending in -56. Slonský rang police headquarters in Prague and asked for a search for such a vehicle, starting from the assumption that a local gang was most likely to be the culprits. Within a few minutes a police patrol reported seeing such a van on the road towards Vsetín.